Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

Bet: Hidden in My Heart

²¹ When you make a vow to the Lord your God, do not delay fulfilling it, because the Lord your God will require it of you and you will be guilty. ²² But if you do not make a vow at all, you will not be guilty. ²³ Whatever has passed from your lips you must be careful to do, because with your own mouth you vowed to make an offering to the Lord your God with your mouth.

²⁴ When you come into your neighbor’s vineyard, you may eat grapes to satisfy your appetite, but you must not put any into your container. ²⁵ When you come into a field of standing grain belonging to your neighbor and you pluck the heads of grain with your hand, you are not allowed to use a sickle to cut his standing grain.

Restrictions on Divorce

24 When a man takes a woman and marries her, if she is not pleasing to him because he has found something indecent about her, and he writes her a divorce document and hands it to her and sends her out of his house, ² and she leaves and moves on and becomes the wife of another man, ³ and then that second man hates her and writes her a divorce document and hands it to her and sends her out of his house, or perhaps the second man that took her as a wife dies, ⁴ in these circumstances her first husband, who sent her away, cannot take her again as his wife after she was stigmatized as impure, because that would be detestable to the Lord. You must not attach guilt to the land that the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance.

¹⁰ When you make a loan to your neighbor, a loan of any kind, do not go into his house to take his security pledge. ¹¹ Stand outside, and the man to whom you are making the loan will bring the pledged object out to you. ¹² If he is a poor man, do not sleep in a garment he has pledged as security. ¹³ You are certainly to return the pledged object to him at sundown so he can sleep in his garment and bless you. Righteousness will be yours before the Lord your God.

¹⁴ Do not oppress a hired person who is poor and needy, whether he is one of your brother Israelites or one of the aliens who reside in your land inside your gates. ¹⁵ Each day, before the sun goes down, pay him his wages, because he is poor and his life depends on it. If you do not, he will cry out against you, and you will be guilty of sin.

Warning Against Partiality

2 My brothers, have faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ without showing favoritism. ² For example, suppose a man enters your worship assembly^[a] wearing gold rings and fine clothing, and a poor man also enters wearing filthy clothing. ³ If you look with favor on the man wearing fine clothing and say, “Sit here in this good place,” but you tell the poor man, “Stand over there” or “Sit down here^[b] at my feet,” ⁴ have you not made a distinction among yourselves and become judges with evil opinions? ⁵ Listen, my dear brothers, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and to be heirs of the kingdom, which he promised to those who love him? ⁶ But you dishonored the poor man. Don’t the rich oppress you, and don’t they drag you into court? ⁷ Aren’t they the ones who blaspheme the noble name that was pronounced over you? ⁸ However, if you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,”^[c] you are doing well. ⁹ But if you show favoritism, you are committing a sin, since you are convicted by this law as transgressors.

Keep the Whole Law

¹⁰ In fact, whoever keeps the whole law but stumbles in one point has become guilty of breaking all of it. ¹¹ For the one who said, “Do not commit adultery,”^[d] also said, “Do not commit murder.”^[e] Now if you do not commit adultery, but you do commit murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. ¹² So speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law of freedom. ¹³ For there will be judgment without mercy on the one who has not shown mercy. Mercy triumphs^[f] over judgment.